Microsoft trolls for patents on holographic meetings

Microsoft has applied for a broad patent covering, among other things, using holography in remote meetings. That’s right, in the future according the MS, we’ll all be talking to holograms of our co-workers. How we’ll do it, what the hardware and software will look like, is still vague. But they’ll figure it out, and it will be so much better than what we have.

Videoconferencing? That’s so twentieth century. WebEx? Nah, that’s Twitter with pictures. Telepresence? Another Web-two-point-oh gee-gaw. Nope, MS looks to commercialize George Lucas’ ideas from a long, long time ago in a galaxy far, far away. And they’ve filed a patent to cover it.

Can’t you see it now? A hologram of Dom Portwood appears outside your cubicle: “Yeah. It’s just that we’re putting new coversheets on all the TPS reports before they go out now. So if you could go ahead and try to remember to do that from now on, that’d be great.”

Gives a whole new meaning to the term “blue screen of death,” doesn’t it? But wait, there’s more: Why, we could have voiceover sessions where we’d actually have to look at the client! You’ll be able to read their body language as you finish the 14th take and wait for yet another line read completely different from the last one!